Distinctive Features - Speech Resource Pages - Macquarie University

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1. syllabic / non-syllabic [syll]: Syllabic sounds constitute a syllable peak (sonority peak). [+syll] refers to vowels and to syllabic consonants. [-syll] refers to all non-syllabic consonants (including semi-vowels). 2. consonantal / non-consonantal [cons]: Consonantal sounds are produced with at least approximant stricture. That is consonantal sounds involve vocal tract constriction significantly greater that that which occurs for vowels. [+cons] refers to all consonants except for semi-vowels (which often have resonant stricture). [-cons] refers to vowels and semi-vowels. 3. sonorant / obstruent [son]: Sonorant sounds are produced with vocal tract configuration that permits air pressure on both sides of any constriction to be approximately equal to the air pressure outside the mouth. Obstruents possess constriction (stricture) that is sufficient to result in significantly greater air pressure behind the constriction than occurs in front of the constriction and outside the mouth. [+son] refers to vowels and approximants (glides and semi-vowels). [-son] refers to stops, fricatives and affricates. 4. coronal / non-coronal [cor]: "Coronal sounds are produced by raising the tongue blade toward the teeth or the hard palate; noncoronal sounds are produced without such a gesture." (HC) This feature is intended for use with consonants only. [+cor] refers to dentals (not including labio-dentals) alveolars, post-alveolars, palato-alveolars, palatals. [-cor] refers to labials, velars, uvulars, pharyngeals. 5. anterior / posterior [ant]: "Anterior sounds are produced with a primary constriction at or in front of the alveolar ridge. Posterior sounds are produced with a primary constriction behind the alveolar ridge." (HC) This feature is intended to be applied to consonants. [+ant] refers to labials, dentals and alveolars. [-ant] refers to post-alveolars, palato-alveolars, retroflex, palatals, velars, uvulars, pharyngeals. 6. labial / non-labial [lab]: Labial sounds involve rounding or constriction at the lips. [+lab] refers to labial and labialised consonants and to rounded vowels. [-lab] refers to all other sounds. 7. distributed / non-distributed [distr]: "Distributed sounds are produced with a constriction that extends for a considerable distance along the midsaggital axis of the oral tract; nondistributed sounds are produced with a constriction that extends for only a short distance in this direction." (HC) [+distr] refers to sounds produced with the blade or front of the tongue, or bilabial sounds. [-distr] refers to sounds produced with the tip of the tongue. This feature can distinguish between palatal and retroflex sounds, between bilabial and labiodental sounds, between lamino-dental and apicodental sounds. 8. high / non-high [high]: "High sounds are produced by raising the body of the tongue toward the palate; nonhigh sounds are produced without such a gesture." (HC) [+high] refers to palatals, velars, palatalised consonants, velarised consonants, high vowels, semi-vowels. [-high] refers to all other sounds. Note, however, the discussion above on how this feature is used in combination with [mid] to describe the distinction between four contrastive vowel heights. 9. mid / non-mid [mid]: Mid sounds are produced with tongue height approximately half way between the tongue positions appropriate for [+high] and [+low]. This vowel height feature is only required when a language has four levels of height contrast and remains unspecified for languages with fewer vowel height contrasts. [+mid] refers to vowels with intermediate vowel height. [-mid] refers to all other sounds. 10. low / non-low [low]: "Low sounds are produced by drawing the body of the tongue down away from the roof of the mouth; nonlow sounds are
produced without such a gesture." [+low] refers to low vowels, pharyngeal consonants, pharyngealised consonants. 11. back / non-back [back]: "Back sounds are produced with the tongue body relatively retracted; nonback or front sounds are produced with the tongue body relatively advanced." (HC) [+back] refers to Velars, uvulars, pharyngeals, velarised consonants, pharyngealised consonants, central vowels, central semi-vowels, back vowels, back semi-vowels. [-back] refers to all other sounds. 12. front / non-front [front]: This is an additional vowel feature added to assist in the description of the vowel systems of languages such as Australian English. To describe the central vowels of Australian English its necessary to define them as [-back, -front]. 13. continuant / stop [cont]: "Continuants are formed with a vocal tract configuration allowing the airstream to flow through the midsaggital region of the oral tract: stops are produced with a sustained occlusion in this region." (HC) For some reason it has been traditional to include lateral consonants as stops in distinctive feature theory. Since laterals can have approximant, fricative or stop (click) stricture there seems to be no justification in including all laterals with the stops, and in this course laterals are not necessarily stops (as is the case for the lateral clicks) but can also be continuants (as is the case for the lateral approximants and fricatives. [+cont] refers to vowels, approximants, fricatives. [-cont] refers to nasal stops, oral stops. 14. lateral / central [lat]: "Lateral sounds, the most familiar of which is [l], are produced with the tongue placed in such a way as to prevent the airstream from flowing outward through the centre of the mouth, while allowing it to pass over one or both sides of the tongue; central sounds do not invoke such a constriction." (HC) [+lat] refers to lateral approximants, lateral fricatives, lateral clicks. [-lat] refers to all other sounds. 15. nasal / oral [nas]: "Nasal sounds are produced by lowering the velum and allowing the air to pass outward through the nose; oral sounds are produced with the velum raised to prevent the passage of air through the nose." (HC) [+nas] refers to nasal stops, nasalised consonants, nasalised vowels. [-nas] refers to all other sounds. 16. tense / lax [tense]: The traditional definition of this feature claims that [+tense] vowels involve a greater degree of constriction then [-tense] (lax) vowels. Tense vowels need not be any different to lax vowels in terms of constriction (e.g. the tense/lax pair /ɐː,ɐ/ in Australian English are produced with the same tongue position but differ in duration). The tense/lax distinction in vowels seems to be related to some kind of strong/weak distinction. In some languages this is realised as a distinction between more peripheral vowels (closer to the four corners of the vowel quadrilateral) and less peripheral vowels (vowels that are either more centred, more mid, or both more centred and more mid). In other languages, a long/short durational distinction is what is often the main acoustic distinction between tense and lax vowels. Note, however, that short vowels are more likely to be produced with under-realised targets (more mid-central) during connected speech than are long vowels because the long vowels have more time to reach their targets. [+tense] refers to tense vowels or long vowels. [-tense] refers to lax vowels or short vowels. 17. sibilant / non-sibilant [sib]: Sibilants are those fricatives with large amounts of acoustic energy at high frequencies. [+sib] refers to [s ʃ z ʒ]. [-sib] refers to all other sounds. 18. spread glottis / non-spread glottis [spread]: "Spread or aspirated sounds are produced with the vocal cords drawn apart producing a nonperiodic (noise) component in the acoustic signal; nonspread or
Page 1 and 2: Topics Distinctive Features © Robe
Page 3 and 4: d) Gradual Oppositions The members
Page 5 and 6: We could refer to all these phoneme
Page 7 and 8: stops are already defined uniquely
Page 9: iv. Place of articulation The [ant]
Page 13 and 14: as lax. Instead we use the [tense]
Page 15 and 16: distinct tense vowel. All other cen
Page 17 and 18: Australian English diphthongs can b
Page 19 and 20: 7. English Consonant Features (an o
Page 21 and 22: 9. Articulatory Features In more re
Page 23: 20. Jakobson, R., Fant, C.G.M. and

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